


Booker's alcoholism

by HelloPotato



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Addiction, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Gen, Mentions of Suicide, and how love and forgiveness are only a part of the picture, and how much it sucks for the person, and the people who love them, in case anyone wanted my rambling thoughts on alcoholism, let us wade into the murky waters of family and addiction my dudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-11
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26401423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HelloPotato/pseuds/HelloPotato
Summary: So, Booker!TLDR: Mental illness and addiction really do mess with your head, and people can end up in a place they never thought they’d be, doing things they never thought they’d do, because of them. And moving on from that is messy and ugly, but sweeping it under the rug doesn’t help anyone in the long-term.Booker needs to do the work to get better, and by the end of the movie it does seem like he wants to do that work.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache & Booker | Sebastien le Livre & Joe | Yusuf al-Kaysani & Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 3
Kudos: 41





	Booker's alcoholism

**Author's Note:**

> This is just my perspective, but I don't think it does Booker's character justice to minimise what he did. And I'm going to be honest...the notion that addiction is an excuse, rather than an explanation, ignores the people who make mistakes and work really hard in the aftermath to make things right. 
> 
> It's not like this is a new take, I know, but holding people accountable and helping them grow is not the same thing as being a judgey monster!

I’m seeing some really un-nuanced Booker takes, so hear me out.

It's genuinely great that people are looking to empathise with and understand Booker and his choices. But more and more it seems like things are swinging in the other direction, to the point where his family is begging for _his_ forgiveness, because this is the easiest way to frame a narrative that includes love and homecoming for Booker. 

I understand the impulse, but this doesn't let Booker grow or recover, not really. 

From all the posts I’ve seen and fics I’ve read, it seems like sometimes there is a lack of understanding as to what the reality of years-long addiction and severe, complex mental illness is really like, and how that relates to a character who is suffering and who makes shitty choices that hurt other people.

I’m not as old as the Old Guard – lol I’m not even as old as Nile – and my little sibling is close to me in age. But my Little Sib has been struggling for years with severe mental illness, suicidal ideation, and serious alcoholism stemming from a need to self-medicate (not to compare them to Booker in the details, obviously).

Needless to say, I love Booker, and he breaks my heart. But as someone from a family of alcoholics, and as someone who is a carer for their alcoholic Little Sib, and lives in fear of losing their Little Sib, I think I’m in a pretty good position to say that the reality of addiction is a lot more complicated than it is being made out to be.

Sometimes, despite all the love and support in the world, an addict will remain an addict, either until they are ready to change or until…well, sometimes they’re an addict for life, and all you can do is hope that they’ll still _have_ a life. This doesn’t make them a bad person (my immediate and extended family ranges the full spectrum from “lovely person suffering greatly” to “abusive, neglectful asshole”), and it’s not a matter of laziness or pulling up socks or whatever. Addiction is horrible and frequently intractable, and there’s a reason for that. But it _does_ mean that you can’t truly help someone who isn’t ready to accept help or admit that they need it.

I’m not sure why people think Joe/Nicky/Andy never noticed or said anything to Booker about his depression or his drinking – after 200 years, it’s impossible that they didn’t. We see them as a family watching tv, eating dinner together, just hanging out, and underneath it all is this awareness that Booker is more tired, more jaded, and more bitter even than Andy. It’s not even an elephant in the room, it’s just a background note to their lives. And after 200 years, I don’t think that’s strange. One thing you learn from living with and caring about an alcoholic is that – no matter how objectively shitty and messed up the situation is – you can get used to anything. And making every day an intervention or a crisis or a breakdown isn’t helpful. So, spending time together, family meals, all of that speaks to me of people who love and care about each other, and support each other, but who know that you can’t change things for someone who isn’t ready to change (and who are probably feeling guilty and paralysed by their inability to care enough to make a difference…).

Based on how much support Nicky and Joe showed Nile in just a few days, I don’t think they’ve been ignoring Booker’s misery or letting him stew in the corner this whole time. Sometimes that happens – it happens even when people love each other, because they don’t know how to help and they deal with it by ignoring the situation. But that doesn’t resonate with me for these characters. 200 years in, and I think they’ve learned the art of quiet support. You can love someone, you can be a shoulder for them to lean on, you can try to protect them from themselves, and you can pick them up, clean up their vomit, and tuck them into bed, all while they fight or snap at you for it – but you can’t make someone get better until they want to get better. And Booker really, really doesn’t want to get better. He wants to die.

Joe/Nicky/Andy aren’t shocked that Booker wants to die – they’re shocked that he’s willing to take them down with him. **They’re shocked that he’s reached the point where he hates himself more than he loves them**. Speaking from experience, it’s a horrible situation for everyone involved, including (and especially) Booker. Because hating yourself more than you love your family/friends makes you selfish (selfish does not equal bad person, but it does stop you from seeing beyond yourself), and Booker signing his whole family up for rounds of medical experimentation and eventual death in pursuit of his own death is undeniably selfish.

I’m not going to comment on the 100 years exile – I agree that if they stuck to it there is no way that Booker would recover on his own, but I don’t think Andromache “Have a little faith” of Scythia or the others would let it get that far – but I will say that unconditional forgiveness doesn’t help anyone. Forgiving someone immediately when they really fuck up, just because _they’re_ really fucked up, and not letting them ever face consequences for their behaviour? That’s not support, and that’s not helpful. That’s enabling, and it took me so, so long to learn that lesson.

I also don’t like the idea that Joe/Nicky/Andy aren’t entitled to anger. I know current progressive narratives around mental illness and addiction are really focused on absolution, and understanding the motivations and influences behind people’s behaviour. But that doesn’t mean that people who hurt others – people who hurt the people they love – aren’t responsible for their actions, and shouldn’t try to make amends.

And this is coming from a person who has never given up on their Little Sib, who has literally been told that their choice to prioritise a safe and supportive environment for their Little Sib is damaging their own health, and whose relationship improved dramatically once Little Sib started owning their behaviour. So, take this in the spirit it’s intended:

Just because you love someone, doesn’t mean you owe them forgiveness. Just because you love someone, doesn’t mean you can’t be angry. I struggle so much with expressing anger, and with letting my Little Sib face consequences, or the emotional repercussions that come with those. I don’t know if I’ll ever quite manage it, to be honest. Anyone with a little sibling will feel me when I say that the instinct to protect them can outweigh everything, even your own hurt/anger/suffering. But it doesn’t help them, it just enables them to keep going without having to change.

Remember, if someone hates themselves, they won’t care about the damage done to them. And quietly lumping it when they hurt you, because they’re hurting and you don’t want to make it worse, just hides them from reality. And they really need that reality check.

So, Booker! _TLDR_ : Mental illness and addiction really do mess with your head, and people can end up in a place they never thought they’d be, doing things they never thought they’d do, because of them. And moving on from that is messy and ugly, but sweeping it under the rug doesn’t help anyone in the long-term. Booker needs to do the work to get better, and by the end of the movie it does seem like he wants to do that work. 


End file.
